Sergey Sergeevich Horujy
In surveying the contemporary world as it appears to us in the daily media, in academic papers, and in our own personal observations, we find much cause for concern about conditions and unsustainable trends on Planet Earth, whether we are considering the health (in all senses of the word) of human populations or the sources of nutritious food, clean water, and affordable housing—or even the quality and character of our thoughts. Freedom together with “good government” (however these are defined) are often short-lived and in limited supply around the globe. The level of discourse in the public square often seems vulgar. The character of public education at all levels often seems unrelated to the actual needs of many people, and the cost, beyond their ability to pay. Nor is it designed to form young people in warm-hearted humanity, which used to be fruit and flower of a kind of Christian humanism in Western civilization. There are, of course, reasons for public education being structured as it is. Education (or training) delivery systems seem designed to serve the interests of corporate entities around the globe, without regard to the telos of human being.
None of these observations or concerns is new. They all, however, derive from who we understand ourselves to be and, consequently, from what we have done to ourselves and to our planet. What, then, is the human being? How shall we understand humankind in the largest possible sense?
Sergey S. Horujy [Хоружий] is a contemporary Russian philosopher whose “Synergic Anthropology” offers both a critique of philosophical anthropology in Western philosophical tradition and also a positive account of the human being based on his knowledge of modern Russian religious philosophy, as well as—and especially—on hesychastic thought and practice. One of Horujy’s most stimulating conversation partners in recent years has been the Confucian scholar, Tu Weiming, of Harvard and Peking University. Read More
ORTHODOXY IN DIALOGUE 